Personalities | Rosa Ponselle | Modern Era | Opera
1897–1981, American
Soprano Ponselle’s auspicious debut took place in 1918 at the Met, as Leonore in La forza del destino with Enrico Caruso. That season, she sang 23 times, mainly in leading roles, and often with Caruso. Ponselle was soon the Met’s leading Italian dramatic soprano, with a dark, ringing, sonorous sound not heard since Claudia Muzio. Her Norma in 1927 was a vocal triumph, yet in the wake of these magnificent performances there was criticism that her music had been transposed down. Commercially successful but critically maligned, she left the Met in 1937 and, after a failed Hollywood screen test for the role of Carmen, made her final concert appearances in 1939. She was just 42.
Introduction | Modern Era | Opera
Personalities | Francis Poulenc | Modern Era | Opera
Houses & Companies | The Birth of the Metropolitan Opera | Turn of the Century | Opera
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